


The Shepherd's Story

by bmouse



Category: Redwall Series - Brian Jacques, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Actually Not Crack, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Fantasy Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-01
Updated: 2012-05-01
Packaged: 2017-11-04 15:29:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/395369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bmouse/pseuds/bmouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a quest to find the 'crystal relic of potential' Lady Teyla has a fireside chat with their enigmatic leader.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Shepherd's Story

The sun had rolled down to touch the treetops and they were no closer to getting into the ancient ruin. Rodney had huffed and sputtered over the indignity of having to deal with the "useless, unscientific, mystical gibberish" but the parchment and its obfuscated poem was still the was the only clue they had. Whatever the 'crystal relic of potential' was, for it had not been seen by the eyes of any beast who still lived, they had to find it. There was barely a season left before the horde of flesh-eating white weasels returned to their old feeding grounds.

At last, with a triumphant "Ha!" Rodney barreled over to an unremarkable ivy-covered patch of wall, and with a strength born of irritation drug his sturdy forepaws into the leaves and began ripping them out. Ronon watched this for what Teyla felt was an unnecessarily long while before quietly stalking over, bodily lifting the hedgehog up and over to the side and then attacking the main body of vines like a beast possessed, each heave punctuated by slaps of his rudderlike tail against the ground.

"Careful, you big lummox!" Rodney bristled. "You want quills in your paws again?"

"What quills?" Ronon rumbled."You're all underbelly, far as I can tell." 

Side by side and bickering halfheartedly they cleared the wall until part of a rotting wooden door was revealed. Teyla told them to head back as soon as they had enough room for Ronon to squeeze through for tomorrow's foray and darted up a nearby elm, heading back toward camp with her report. The snares and traps she'd set around the perimeter were undisturbed, it seemed they would have at least this one quiet night.

 

Shepherd was sitting by the fire stirring something stew-like in a hanging pot. With long legs stretched out in front of him, eyelids and whiskers at half-mast he was the very picture of daydreaming inattention but when she landed behind him he flicked a black velvety ear in her direction. 

"How's them fellers?" he drawled.

"They have found a doorway. I believe they will return as soon as Rodney feels the way in is safe enough for him to navigate."

Shepherd's nose twitched. "Might be a while." 

Teyla pulled her bedroll out of the pack pile and sat down on it, diplomatically suppressing a sigh. She was somewhat used to his ways by now, but couldn't deny that things were easier with the others. Who would have thought that she of all of them would come to regret silence? He and Ronon spoke sometimes, but only Rodney's chatter could trigger in their leader the outrageous loquaciousness of his species. 

She was honest enough to admit she envied him that. Maybe that was why she asked it.

"Why do they call you Shepherd?"

His eyes were still at half-mast but his head turned up toward her."From the family name mostly. I got one of those fancy long names everyone gets in the Long Patrol families and mine ended with 'Sheppard'. Sounds alike, y'see? As for when they started callin’ me that and nothin’ else, well..." he scratched sheepishly at the back of his head like a young leveret "it's one o them sad, boring war stories."

Teyla knew she should be content with that much but perhaps her mouth had caught Rodney's bad habits and did not wait for her mind's approval.

"I would like to hear that story."

She let her ears relax, rounded her shoulders trying to dispel the stiff, formal dignity she carried, even so far from her people.

"Please.”

Her companion picked up a branch and lazily shifted the logs in the fire. A small, bright army of sparks rose up, drifting towards him on an evening breeze. Some made it as far as his whiskers but even so he did not move. Teyla, the mission, and the fire were far away now. 

He spoke.

"Well some seasons back, there I was; Major Sheppard, shiny medals on my mess jacket deployed out to the dunes with my shiny new team and my best mates from the training days. Buncha bandits and horde remnants and all manner of scum were bandin' together and it was our job to root them out before they found someone to lead em.” 

“Bad place to have a war those dunes, and they knew ‘em better. Ambushed us almost as often as we ambushed them. Captured some of ours, left the pieces behind when they were done. Wraith ain't the first vermin I seen who eat their enemies. Then I get some bad news: my old messmate Sergeant Holland, him and his squad got captured. I… I lost my head. Broke lines, left my post, disobeyed orders. Took my squad with me. They didn't take much convincing. Green little things, thought I hung the moon and polished the stars. And I went to get him back.”

“Turned out the ones who got Holland were their bigwigs, the worst of the lot and there were more of them than us. We fought our way to the prisoners but then it was all of us surrounded. We made 'em pay for it, made a lot of red sand but they had numbers on us. My lieutenant took a spear was meant for me. My frontrunners grew arrows when they tried to break for reinforcements. Our quartermaster broke her mace on three ferret skulls before they got her. And Holland, Holland they'd hurt but he still took a fox the size of Ronon with him and the last thing he said to me was 'you shouldn't have come, old chap' "

The black hare's eyes were wide open. In the fire a log split, loud as thunder, and sparks flickered in them like trapped fireflies. 

"Pretty soon it was just me. Just me and the rest of them, all those screaming vermin and all of us bound for Hellgates. I just... shepherded them along." 

"How many?"

The Shepherd shrugged, shook his head from side to side like a surfacing diver. 

"Don't rightly know. Said it was almost a score but that's just what they said they counted. I don't remember it so well."

"I thought only Badger Lords suffered the Bloodwrath." 

He smiled at her. Softly, indulgently. 

"No, bless your bushy tail Lady Teyla that's just a rumor. The Bloodwrath is for everyone."

**Author's Note:**

> I have no excuse, except I grew up on Redwall books and had a mad passionate love of Stargate Atlantis until it got bad. Also Sheppard's backstory is downright Redwallian and I spent way, waaay too much time thinking of what animals Rodney(hedgehog), Ronon(otter) and Teyla(squirrel) would be.


End file.
